


Mad Dog and Puppy

by Blitzpie



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-18
Updated: 2020-08-18
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:07:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25981855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blitzpie/pseuds/Blitzpie
Summary: This story is from the Haikyuu!! Light novel 6, the english translation from fervidian87 on tumblr (now deactivated). I've made some very minimal grammatical changes, and am posting in the hopes more people will be able to read the story as it's very difficult to find if you've never heard of it.
Kudos: 7





	Mad Dog and Puppy

One fine holiday in fall, there was a man standing in a convenience store nearby Aoba Jousai High School. The guy, wearing a volleyball jersey, walked out as the opening and closing door made an electronic sound. The man’s name is Kyoutani Kentarou, a second-year member in Aoba Jousai High’s volleyball club.

Kyoutani tore the wrapping of the chicken—chicken is his favorite food—that he took out of the convenience store bag before sinking his teeth into it, making an audible noise; this was how he walked toward school. The volleyball club took Mondays off. Practice starts morning today, which is a Sunday.

Kyoutani had not attended the club for quite a while since the middle of his first year due to various circumstances, though he has been recently thrown into the spotlight for coming back after being recalled by Oikawa, the team captain.

At the preliminary round of the Inter-High Miyagi Finals in June, Aoba Jousai suffered defeat at the hands of Shiratorizawa Academy, the invincible champions. It was necessary to regroup and reorganize the currently completed team in order to clear themselves of the disgrace come the next Spring High School competition, move on from second place and aim for the Nationals. What they wanted to strengthen in particular was their offense. The fighting strength that served to be the trigger of that was Kyoutani, whom Oikawa jokingly called “Mad Dog.”

**********  
For Kyoutani, club activities are frankly troublesome; everyone in the club is annoying and he wished they would stop calling him Mad Dog or anything for that matter. Though he tries not to care about that too much, as long as he gets to keep playing volleyball. 

While there was a common agreement for the time being among the manager, coaches, the captain and other third-year members on what to do about him, at any rate, Kyoutani‘s fellow second-years had more complex considerations. They, who had been practicing everyday since he left, felt they’d been working hard only to be sidelined by Kyoutani who just came back as if nothing happened when they thought he already quit.

That same Kyoutani also did not seem keen to a change of heart just because he came back, his attitude still as bad as his manner of speaking. And while they thought things would turn out fine if Kyoutani thoroughly practiced at the very least, he would often still come late to practice.

In the third gymnasium where the volleyball club is gathered, Yahaba Shigeru, a second-year back-up setter, clicked his tongue silently as he glared at the clock on the wall.

**********

Kyoutani was noisily eating his chicken while walking down the road when his mouth came to a stop. His feet, hurrying as he thinks he’s running late, stop at the same time. He noticed a small cardboard box placed at the middle of a gaping-wide, empty plot of land—basically like a missing tooth—in the residential area along the street he uses everyday to go to school.

“…?”

The empty lot was covered in tall grass, and it didn’t seem like it had only been there since yesterday or today. But Kyoutani had never noticed this area. That it had suddenly caught his attention must have been because of the cardboard box. The cardboard box from an online shopping website that could often be seen here and there did not appear to have been trampled upon or crushed nor did it appear to have been drenched in rain and lost its shape; it was properly, squarely propped up and brand new, which made it unnatural, and it was almost like a poorly constructed trap.

Regardless, Kyoutani came up and stepped into the thicket quickly without hesitation and peeked inside the box.

“…Fur?”

A light-brown furball that is around two sizes smaller than a volleyball is inside wrapped in an old towel. As soon as he tried to crouch and touch it, two wet, small, black eyes appeared from inside the round ball. Kyoutani, surprised, pulled back his stretched-out hand.

“It has eyes!”

Inside the box, the furball opened its red mouth and made a vague sound. That is when Kyoutani finally realized.

“A dog.”

What was inside the cardboard box seemed to be an abandoned puppy. It’s very small and frail, and it doesn’t have a collar on. That said, a lot of dogs walk in that area, so it’s not an unusual sight at all. Kyoutani, concerned he was going to be late, resolved to leave the place immediately.

However, the puppy clambered up the box making it tumble and fall to the ground and followed Kyoutani as it cried. It turned back but cried helplessly with its small tail waving back and forth.

“… Meat.”

Kyoutani noticed that it was following because of the chicken he was holding, so he threw the last of it into his mouth in one go, noisily chewed and then drank water. He then folded up the paper wrapping, pocketing it and immediately walked out of the lot.

It is a dog after all. It only tried to follow me because I had food, that‘s all. Thinking that, he headed to school without looking back. He would get a scolding if he arrived late, so it was for his sake that he rush and ignore some dog.

Walking at a quick pace, Kyoutani slowly sulked. A rush of memories came and went and he suddenly felt bad.

He expected to be made to come back by Oikawa, the team captain, but the unsettling part was having to hear complaints from other members for such a small matter as if he was the only one who had been causing trouble all the time. He even thinks to himself of quitting this shitty club on the spot if he so ever hears someone self-importantly explain to him that volleyball is about team play while lecturing him. Thinking that, he even became angry at himself for staying with the club for these past months without quitting. The wave of exhaustion that had slowly been building over him was starting to crash. There probably really wasn’t much of an excuse for losing his shit on people, but he realized that his desire to start yelling and acting like a completely impatient prick was really only a desire to let out his exhaustion, frustrations, and confusion.

He’s never told anyone that and never will. He thinks, just maybe, that they wouldn’t understand.

“…”

Club activities are annoying, and the fact that the cuff of his jersey keeps brushing against his ankles whenever he takes a step is annoying too. The grass in the empty lot might have been wet with the morning dew. He thought of that as he looked at his foot. And when he did, he realized he was about to step on a black-ish shadow or something, so he stopped in panic as if a piece of trash had landed in front of him.

However, before his feet was no trash but the puppy earlier looking up at Kyoutani.

It made a sound.

“The dog.”

Why is it still following him when he has no food anymore? Does he still have the scent of meat? Without realizing, he tried to take a sniff of his jersey, but he’s not sure. Kyoutani furrows his eyebrows and glared at the puppy silently. However, the puppy, probably because it was still small and untrained or because animals cannot precisely comprehend human emotions, coiled around Kyoutani’s feet and cried.

“…You’re in my way.”

That is what he said, but of course his words remain undecipherable to the puppy, who bites Kyoutani’s pants while tumbling and crying; it is enjoying the moment, even letting its tongue out.

“…”

He strangely became irritated while looking at that innocent furball. “Becoming attached to anyone and starting to beg food from them is probably what you do. You probably go around stealing people’s convenience store chicken knowing they couldn’t possibly resist a small creature like you, but that’s where you’re wrong,” he said.

Okay, maybe he had been a little harsh. Or maybe a lot. 

But having accepted the puppy wouldn’t understand anything he was saying, Kyoutani left the poor dog and ran away. He has to go to the club anyway.

He thinks he can hear its helpless voice from behind him, but he ignores it and continues running.

Yahaba would probably see this as some kind of sarcastic mockery, wouldn’t he? Well, of course he would. 

This whole thing is stupid.

Kyoutani thought it was ridiculous to be running then when he was already late anyway, but he continued to sprint toward school, never slowing his pace.

This day is going to suck.

**********

“You’re late. Are you actually serious about this?”

As soon as he arrived at the gym and removed his jacket came Yahaba’s jeering. Kyoutani, ignoring him—though he does momentarily get upset about it—joins for spiking practice. He did arrive late, and he has no choice but to explain to them that it is a dog’s fault. He’s watching Yahaba while he speaks, can’t even explain to himself why, because he shouldn’t care, but he does. Regardless, the benchwarmer didn’t mind telling him things as they are.

While Yahaba has been grumbling his discontent even after Kyoutani had silently fallen in line, he finally shuts up when his fellow second-year Watari glares at him. Oikawa, the captain, who had been looking at what Yahaba had been doing from across the net, also kept calmly focused on his own practice. This degree of dispute had not been a rare occurrence since Kyoutani’s return, but it was better compared to last year’s. Things were grimmer that time to the point that Kyoutani would ditch club activities. He supposes it’s better now since he hasn’t quit yet.

The gym’s atmosphere returns to normal and practice restarts after having momentarily paused. Yahaba and Oikawa stand on either side of the net, and they go and toss to the spikers who enter the court taking turns. Next is Kyoutani’s turn. He throws the ball to Yahaba, the setter, and runs. The toss was made. He steps in looking at the ball, jumps and hits it.

Before that, everyone else made impeccable spikes that no one could complain about. However, Kyoutani hits the ball taking advantage of his weight and power, but upon landing, bumps into Yahaba while bearing that excessive force on his way down.

“Ow! Why would you bump into me?! Watch where you’re going! You came late and still have the guts to do that?”

Kyoutani also grows angry as Yahaba complained, his hands on the floor.

“What does my being late have to do with bumping into you?”

“Whatever! I’ve had enough of your excuses. I’m just telling you to take things seriously!”

That caused Kyoutani to hesitate. He had expected Yahaba to supply his reasons for him, so he could just deny everything while watching the results.

He gets up heavily and looks down at Yahaba, who is still on the ground, and says:

“Aren’t you the one who should be taking things seriously?” Even to himself, Kyoutani knows his voice sounds way too harsh, but he can’t help it, and he can’t explain it, and he won’t even try.

Yahaba’s eyes fix instantly in that furious way that Kyoutani tiredly decides he’s never going to live down. “What did you say?!”

Kyoutani takes a deep breath. He can’t talk about this, he’s barely holding his shit together. “…I’m going home.” And that sounded so pathetic he’s almost ashamed of himself.

“Huh?!”

Yahaba, his eyes wide upon hearing Kyoutani’s quite selfish remarks, didn’t try to stop him. “We don’t need Kyoutani in the team. We can win without him. We’d be better off without him,” he thought.

The club members were dumbfounded. Kyoutani who had just arrived left the gym alone.

**********

The winds of fall felt awfully cold as if in connection with him leaving the hot, stuffy gym. Kyoutani returned to the path he had dejectedly come from.

He came to play volleyball, yet he couldn’t do a single decent spike. He was so frustrated, asking himself how it had come to this point he almost wanted to scream. Club activities were troublesome, and all the club members were annoying. Come to think of it, it doesn’t matter if it were a team composed of hard-working individuals or even if it weren’t a school club at all as long as he can play volleyball. There are a lot of teams everywhere. Volleyball isn’t something people cannot do if they aren’t wearing the Seijou uniform.

At that moment, Kyoutani heard some crunching sounds in his pocket. It’s the paper wrapping of the convenience store chicken. He took notice of it at once and wanted to quickly throw it away, thinking of it as a huge bother due to his frustration. He thought of going back to the convenience store when he realized upon raising his head that he was all of a sudden back in front of the empty lot earlier.

“…”

It felt like a premonition of a mildly uneasy event to come. However, without even giving him time to escape, the thicket rustled, revealing a dark reddish-brown furball that tumbled out.

It makes a sound.

“…It’s you again.”

The puppy coils around the cuff of his jersey pants as if it remembers Kyoutani or it remembers the smell of the convenience store chicken. Why is that? Why is it so attached to him? He never gave it food, yet why? Kyoutani was struck with questions. But he immediately stopped thinking about it, and at that moment thought of once again running away to another direction.

“What is it with you? You could be playing with other dogs, you know?”

Oh hell no. Not now.

He turns too fast, knows he does, stumbles and feels like an idiot, but who the hell could blame him? Yahaba is feet away, wearing the same Seijou jersey uniform. He stands with seeming unease, glaring at Kyoutani, his gaze fixed on him like a spotlight of pure, unrelenting interrogation.

“You came back to us after being asked, and now you’re playing with a dog?” His voice is so off-hand that Kyoutani can’t read it. That makes him nervous.

However, Yahaba seemed surprised when he noticed the cardboard box sitting there.

“Oh, is that an abandoned dog?”

Kyoutani sulkily nods as the puppy remained coiled around him.

Yahaba raises his voice for some reason. “Are you going to take in an abandoned dog or something?” There’s all this shock and excitement in his voice that would be funny as hell if it were, oh, any other time and any other day. “This ain’t no shoujo manga, you know! For goodness sake, stop fucking with me! For all I know, you could be planning something awful!”

What the hell is he talking about? Goddammit. “Fuck off, Yahaba. Damn, you’re so fucking crazy. Just leave me alone!”

Kyoutani thinks it may say something about their relationship that Yahaba doesn’t even blink.

“But what are you really doing here, Kyoutani? I don’t buy that you left practice just to play adorable puppy finder, though that’s what I’m going to tell anyone that asks, just so you know.”

Annoying little shit.

For his part, Yahaba had never liked the careless and conceited way Kyoutani behaved since he joined the club in their first year. Or rather than not liking him, it was annoying that Kyoutani kept causing trouble with their senpais despite the two of them belonging in the same year. Kyoutani would yell “fucking shits” to their third-year seniors and just generally go around not giving a fuck like he had no common sense. You’d think he’d been living his whole life so senselessly.

But indeed Kyoutani was amazing. It was frustrating but he was incredible and had no equal among their grade. They had him join practice matches, and was also a regular first-year player in official games. That’s why it was frustrating, since the same people also expected something out of him. Yet that guy…he was amazing yet picked fights with their senpais and was hated by them in return. He would take on challenges he could not win; it was as if he didn’t care about anything at all. People were honestly relieved when he stopped showing up to club activities.

But even Yahaba could not vocalize any complaints when Kyoutani was called back by Oikawa. They treated him like some hotshot rookie despite him being gone the whole time. Even worse, he barely came to practice making people wonder why he even came back at the first place, though he still played as amazingly. He was really a frustrating fellow.

Irritated by the memory, Yahaba watched Kyoutani standing before him. He silently glared at the dog biting and pulling at the cuff of his teammate’s jersey.

With his back turned, Kyoutani thinks he can actually hear Yahaba grinding his teeth.

“Why the hell did you even show up late just to leave on your own and then bother some abandoned dog?”

“I‘m not bothering it! This dog just followed me by himself!”

“Are you trying to appeal to girls by telling them animals like you?”

“What the fuck?!”

They just keep exchanging words like that, and while they do so, the puppy tumbles around Kyoutani’s shoes and seems to be falling asleep.

Yahaba continues, dropping his voice to convey how very, very serious this discussion suddenly is. “You know that dog is going to be trouble, right? We have to make sure it’s taken somewhere farther from here.”

Kyoutani searches for the right response. Play dumb? Look shocked? Throw a fit? Or…“Huh?”

“I think I have an idea.”

“Does it involve leaving?”

Yahaba grins at him now like he’s the funniest thing ever. Then he laughs. It’s an odd, almost foreign sound–he hasn’t heard Yahaba laugh in way too long, and it’s edgeless, and it’s amused as hell, and it’s just Yahaba all over again. And through all this, Kyoutani tries not to pay attention to how weird this whole thing makes him feel. “Sort of.”

Kyoutani raises his brows at that statement. “I really, really don’t like how you said that.”

“Jeez, stop glaring! And anyway, as if I’m going to believe you. You senseless moron. I wouldn’t even be surprised if you ate that dog alive.”

Kyoutani decides to ignore that, not sure why Yahaba seems determined to piss him off. Bastard.

Yahaba continued mumbling and then held up the puppy that had fallen asleep atop Kyoutani’s shoes. “This puppy needs to eat. You think you can get some dog food?”

“Sure, I can pull some out of my ass,” Kyoutani snapped. 

Yahaba snorts his opinion of that one, then he looks up, studying Kyoutani’s face. Kyoutani doesn’t dare move. One wrong move and he won’t be able to breathe. Yahaba does that to him sometimes. 

Yahaba relaxes then. Whatever he saw, or didn’t see, in Kyoutani’s face seems to satisfy him. He then puts the puppy back inside the cardboard box, holds the thing up to his chest and urges the other boy, “Hey, we’re going.” He doesn’t even know why he’s saying this. He’s not seriously thinking of–he just isn’t.

“…Huh. Where?”

Kyoutani grew flustered. Where on earth could they be going with a dog in hand? At any rate, Yahaba didn’t seem to have any idea where to go either.

“For the meantime, how about the police? They might tell us at least where to bring it. Anyway, you carry it since you found it in the first place. I don’t want to get bitten. Hey.“

Yahaba’s eyes flicker down, fixing on Kyoutani with that disturbing team-radar that he seems to have tuned on him at some point.

Kyoutani takes a slow, deep breath, clearing his head. Thinking this through will mean he’ll screw it up. That’s what always happens when he overthinks something. It’s what happens when anyone overthinks something. Do it or don’t, but don’t sit on your ass–or stand in the middle of an empty lot–and try to think about it.

“Fine. I think you’re out of your mind, but fine.” The grumbly undertones hide the worry.

“Great,” Yahaba answers with a spastic nod, and the tiny fluff of hair at the top of his head jerks around hypnotically. Kyoutani realizes it’s almost impossible to look away. "Let’s go then, Mad Dog-chan.“

Kyoutani gives him a narrow look and makes a bitterly amused sound. "I hate that.”

“You never told us before,” Yahaba actually looks concerned.

“Nobody asked.”

“I mean, I remember you telling Oikawa-san to stop calling you weird names, but I don’t think anyone’s realized that you actually hate it.”

“What a fucking surprise,” Kyoutani sneers.

Flexing his fingers, he takes a breath and lets it out like he was taught. Easy and slow. It’s been worse. Other people have done and said worse. At least, he thinks so. “Whatever. Call me anything you want, just tell me where the fuck we’re going.”

Yahaba pauses, looks at him seriously. And though they’re standing right in front of each other, the look in his eyes says he may as well be a thousand miles away. “I guess we have a lot to talk about, Kyoutani.”

Are you lying to me, Yahaba? “Any reason why?”

Yahaba drops his head to contemplate his outstretched foot. “I’m bored?”

“Try again.”

“Because you apparently want people to ask you stuff? And I think that’s cool. I can think of a lot of things to start with.”

Kyoutani bites back something snarky and unkind, swallowing a lump in his throat and wondering if he could possibly be any more annoyed than he is right now. But whatever. It’s never comfortable to remember their earlier spats, and if this could make things a little better, then what the hell. Besides, he just isn’t up to any more arguing today. He shrugs his shoulders. “You ever tell anyone anything, I’ll deny it.”

Inside the box they’d been pushing back and forth to each other comfortably slept the lumpy, small ball of fur. Its breathing was surprisingly fast, faster than when it was coiled around Kyoutani’s feet, as if to show evidence that it was a living thing.

**********

Somehow—and Kyoutani has no idea how, never will, doesn’t even care—Kyoutani and Yahaba walked the road side by side carrying the cardboard box. Both of them were completely silent, though they sometimes peeked inside when the dog moved or made a sound. And when their eyes accidentally meet, they would turn away and awkwardly face somewhere else. This happened many times over, uncomfortable enough for them, until Yahaba who was then lightly carrying the box finally said, “Having a dog inside an online shopping website’s cardboard box feels almost like you got a dog delivered to you, doesn’t it?”

“…”

Yahaba, a bit embarrassed that Kyoutani only continued walking without giving any response, snapped. “Hey, you’re supposed to say something in return when someone talks to you. What sort of reaction was that?”

“…You’re boring.”

“You’re the last person I want to hear that from! And just so you know, when the senpais are proved right and we actually end up becoming friends in the future, you’re going to feel so dumb for ignoring me.”

Kyoutani makes a weird sound right next to him. Like he’s choking to death, though he can still walk okay, so Yahaba’s not too worried.

“Oh, there’s the police box! Let’s go.”

The two entered while carrying the box. A young police officer is seated on a chair writing something, and he looks at their faces. The police box was small to the point that nobody could fit anymore after the two went in; it had posters about remittance fraud and traffic safety, leaflets about wanted criminals and maps of the neighborhood pasted all over. The police officer examines the insides of the box without a word after taking a peek at them as if suspecting Kyoutani’s bad expression.

“Whose dog is this?”

However, Kyoutani just says vague statements like, “It went after my convenience store chicken,” and “I came from practice.” Yahaba had no choice but to answer from the side.

“Um, it’s an abandoned dog, so we’d like to ask what we should do with it.”

“Doesn’t it have a collar?”

“It’s still small, and it was in this box wrapped in a towel. I think it was thrown away.”

“You picked it up?”

Yahaba shook his head upon being asked by the police officer. “This guy did,” he said as he turned his eyes to Kyoutani, who was just staring straight ahead, like he had nothing to do with this conversation at all.

“You there,” the police officer said nodding his head. He took out documents from a drawer and looked at Kyoutani. “It will be received here at the police box as quasi-lost property, but will you care for it in case the owner did throw it away or the owner doesn’t appear?”

“…Huh?”

Kyoutani was surprised and then looked at Yahaba as if asking for help. However, Yahaba just shrugged. The police officer looked at the two and started explaining, as if he had been repeating a set phrase he had gotten used to saying often, with a gentle nod.

“Ah, in case the owner does not appear, it will be moved to a health center after a few days, but there it will be temporarily …”

Despite him just having started speaking, Kyoutani suddenly slams the desk. The color of the police officer’s eyes changed, but Kyoutani yelled without regard.

“What crap is that? We’re asking you where to bring it so we can have someone take care of it! That’s what I want to hear about!”

“Just wait, you idiot!”

Shaking off Yahaba’s effort to stop him, Kyoutani glared at the police officer. “We don’t need your help anymore!!”

Having said that over his shoulder, Kyoutani rushed out of the police box carrying the cardboard box, the puppy poking its face out of it. Yahaba was left alone in the police box, bowing his head saying, “I’m sorry. That guy’s an idiot,” as an excuse and followed Kyoutani who had run off to somewhere.

Upon finding Kyoutani who was standing a little far away all the while holding the box, Yahaba ran to follow him without pause.

“What the hell was that back there?! You do understand you’re not helping, right?! Though I was surprised too when he told us to bring it to a health center…”

“I know he was surprised, but would a person normally suddenly yell like that? You would have to be crazy to yell at the police, right? Was that occasion not more appropriate to just look annoyed, get out without a scene and ask for help? What was the point of coming all the way here only for you to get mad?” thought Yahaba, but he didn’t feel Kyoutani would comprehend it even if he said it. The newborn puppy seems more likely to understand than Kyoutani. Even now, Kyoutani continues to silently glare at Yahaba’s feet, making Yahaba wonder what it could be that has piqued his interest. The dog inside the box was staring at Kyoutani’s face with its wet eyes.

While it was looking at them, Yahaba found himself suddenly thinking of many different trivial things:

“This guy doesn’t really have a clue. Fine, let’s go to the police, he said. They’ll help us. Or not. I don’t understand why this dog is ignoring me, why it’s so attached only to this jerk.”

"Stop deciding things on your own. I really don’t understand you.”

Just as Yahaba said that, Kyoutani quickly turned on his heel without even nodding at Yahaba and walked toward town, still carrying the box. "I’m trying to help, asshole.”

Is this guy serious?

“Wow, you’re really something else,” Yahaba thought with a slight sense of admiration. Moving his brows as if to ask where they’re headed to, Kyoutani just ignores him and goes to walk steadily alone. A helpless cry can sometimes be heard making a sound.

While gazing at the distance with Kyoutani’s back getting smaller and smaller, Yahaba tells himself: “This is good for now. The mad dog and an abandoned dog—that’s just too much for me, and surely this task would be too much for anyone, too. Anyway, he’s not a kid anymore, and he’ll probably figure it all out by himself. And even if he doesn’t, that wouldn’t be my fault.”

However, Yahaba felt his mood grow heavy and clouded. Something is pulling him into action, like small fishbones poking the insides of his throat. In his mind’s eye, he can see Kyoutani looking at him absently, and Yahaba hates that look on his face: stubbornness warring with an unhappiness so deep he can feel it from here.

“Oh, this is bad.”

There’s no reason why he should, why he should want to do this. None at all.

He eventually accepts it.

“Wait for me, for fuck’s sake! The senpais will get mad at me if I don’t come back with you!” 

In the end, Yahaba chases Kyoutani and the puppy.

**********

Beyond the police box is a main road that gets a lot of pedestrian traffic. Yahaba stopped and turned to Kyoutani and the puppy. “Okay, listen to me before you decide to get stubborn. With how things have turned out, it’d be best to entrust this to someone we can trust.”

However, Kyoutani only glares at Yahaba, his expression betraying his disagreement.

“…”

“What’s that look for? I mean, can you take care of this? Or do you actually want to go back to the police?”

Kyoutani was exasperated as he averted his eyes; the puppy stretches its body from the box and licks his chin. Kyoutani puckers his face and half-heartedly returns the puppy inside the box as he was tickled by its fur. Yahaba tried not to pay attention to the cute interaction.

“Neither of us can take care of it. And since that’s the case, we’ve got no choice. Surely kind-looking people love dogs. A kind little girl and a puppy—that’s the best-case scenario, right? It should be totally better visually than you and a puppy, shouldn’t it? Right?”

While he didn’t really understand why the person they would hand the dog over to had to be a girl, that scenario was indeed better. If they can’t take care of it themselves, there’s no choice but to find another person who can. Kyoutani reluctantly agrees.

“Fine, let’s find one.”

Yahaba hadn’t even realized he wasn’t breathing until it escapes in a soft sigh. Okay, that’s done. He immediately looked around their surroundings. It’s still early in the morning, and naturally his eyes would land upon a person who is out to walk their dog. Among these persons who already have a dog, there should be at least one of them who would not mind taking in another one, he thought.

He tries approaching a few people, but none of them would take in a puppy. While he thought taking care of one or taking care of two made no difference and took the same amount of time and effort, it was probably not so. Is there no one who would willingly accept a dog and just think of it as the little brother or sister of the dog they already own?

When the two grew tired, the puppy who had been quiet inside the box all that time suddenly made a shrilling bark.

“Woof, woof, woof!”

The two looked at the distance thinking it was barking at the appearance of its original owner. But the person immediately averted his eyes and looked at the ground.

The person that was there was a poorly built man who didn’t quite fit the morning atmosphere. Yahaba, his eyes not particularly looking at anything, tells Kyoutani with a small voice, “Hey, make it shut up. Do something, Kyoutani,” imploring him to make it quiet, though the puppy didn’t seem to care and continued to bark. After a while, the man seemed to have noticed that it was him being relentlessly barked at by the dog.

“Hey, what is it?”

The man slowly comes close. The way he’s looking at them is threatening. The way Kyoutani was looking back at him is also threatening, but it is a wholly different notch higher. The dog continues to bark even more. This is bad, and it’s getting worse, thought Yahaba who decided to just let this misunderstanding come to pass. Just as when he had convinced himself that it was best not to say anything unnecessary, to fake a smile and avoid making trouble and to slowly move on without provoking anyone, Kyoutani suddenly dashed out toward the man barking like a dog.

“Who’re you? We’re not doing anything! What are you looking at?!!”

“…!?”

Yahaba promptly pulls the mad dog back and ran away. He can hear someone yelling, “You want a piece of me, brats!?” But it was preferable for school sports club members to just run away. Yahaba yells while running for his life:

“Why would you go pick a fight with someone like that?! Look at your opponent!”

“Shut up!”

“Huh!?”

He continues to run regretting not escaping alone and deserting this idiot and his idiot dog. Yahaba finally came to a stop thinking they’d be fine by then having come from several blocks away at that point.

“Fucking hell.”

He clicks his tongue looking at Kyoutani beside him with the cardboard box in his hands not even looking tired at the very least despite running out of breath, at least compared to himself who is breathing with his shoulders. It really angers him.

“Why did you fucking come back…” Yahaba told him and looked at the distance as if unable to endure any further. Suddenly, the color of his eyes sharply changes. Yahaba combs his hair with his hands, steals the cardboard box from Kyoutani uttering, “Sorry!” before running off. Kyoutani chases him, the hardest chase he gave in his whole life.

In the end, what Yahaba was chasing after all was a group of high school girls in uniform.

“Girls! What do you think? Would you care to look at a puppy? A puppy!”

The girls variously reacted with caution at first: “Eh?”, “Is this for filming or something?”, “Does it bite?” But they timidly looked inside the box, likely enchanted by Yahaba’s gentleness. They then shriek out of joy upon noticing a puppy curled up into a ball inside.

“Eh, is this really a dog? Oh no, it’s so cute. Look, look!”

“What’s this? Is this a real dog, like does it really move? Why is it inside a box? You’re doing this to record our reactions, aren’t you?”

“What dog is this? It’s so fluffy.”

“Isn’t this a Shiba? Shiba Inu. Right? Did I guess correctly?”

One of the girls who came forward and said that blushed with a hiccup. Her eyes were fixed onto the face beside Yahaba’s. That prompted him to look at the space next to him, and there was Kyoutani glaring at the girls, his eyes brimming with bloodlust.

The other girls also notice Kyoutani’s stare and find themselves frozen.

“Hey, what are you doing?!”

It was too late, however, and the girls let out a high-pitched scream and ended up running away. Yahaba loses his patience and violently gets mad.

“Stop glaring! One of them could have taken this dog! We had good communication, and you were staring at them as if you wanted to turn them into stone! What was that all about? Are you some kind of Medusa!?”

Kyoutani steals the box and the dog back from Yahaba and snaps back. “Do you have some ulterior motive?!”

“I don’t! I mean, I did but that’s got nothing to do with what happened just now!”

“You never have no ulterior motives.”

The puppy also cries as if to add to the tension.

“Are you a total idiot!?”

A car pulled over next to the two boys who had been arguing at the middle of the road. They immediately kept their mouths silent, then a woman revealed her face from the driver’s seat and spoke. Her words were beyond anything the two could have possibly expected.

“Excuse me. You don’t really want to throw that dog away, do you?”

Noticing that Kyoutani is instantly growing into a frenzy upon hearing that sentence, Yahaba stops him saying, “Just wait!” What is up with him? Is he some kind of feral child? Is he less evolved than a dog?

The woman gets off the car and speaks to them while Yahaba calmed Kyoutani down.

“Do you know what would happen if you threw that dog away? Even if you leave it to an animal shelter, there is no guarantee that its owner would be found.”

“It’s not like we don’t know that already!” Kyoutani barks as if ready to bite, while the woman asked with mild bewilderment, “Eh, then why are you …”

“You shut up already,” Yahaba seethes and commands Kyoutani to keep quiet before he told her the actual story of how they picked up an abandoned dog and how they were then trying to find a new owner. Upon hearing their and the dog’s bizarre adventure, the woman apologizes saying, “I’m sorry. It seems I misunderstood the situation,” then she struck the hood of the car she had been riding.

“But it’s a good thing I called you out. I’m going to look for its owner myself.”

“… Eh?”

Kyoutani and Yahaba looked at her blankly and observed the car she’s been riding in more carefully. The hood of that roundish car had drawings of dogs and cats, written on it was the name of a veterinary hospital.

“Veterinary hospital…?”

The woman worked at a veterinary hospital and she explained that she can find an owner by coordinating with organizations that help abandoned dogs and cats.

“Our hospitals also have fliers recruiting people who want to own pets.”

Upon saying that, the woman took the box where the puppy was in from Kyoutani. The puppy whined and licked Kyoutani’s hand when his hands let go of the box.

“I will contact you when we find an owner.”

She places the box on the rear passenger seat saying that and closes the door. Then they could see the dog through the glass but couldn’t hear its cries.

The woman hopped into the driver’s seat and immediately drove off. Yahaba bowed at its rear window, but Kyoutani just stood there stiffly as if feeling uneasy.

The car was soon out of sight, and the puppy issue ended an instant too soon. The two of them quarreling just earlier then felt like a dream. But it was not a dream; it was real. And speaking of reality, they must go back to the club soon. Yahaba turned to Kyoutani who was standing beside him. “Hey, look. The dog’s gone now, and we have to go soon.”

“…”

Kyoutani glared at Yahaba as if sulking. And he kept at it. But Yahaba understood how Kyoutani felt. It was a strange feeling, as if a hole had been punched through his heart, or as if a feeling could not linger because of how fast reality had unfolded. But they can’t afford to slack off here, either.

“Everyone’s waiting. You caused some trouble for the senpais, and it wasn’t something you should have shown to our juniors, either. Just realize that you have teammates who are waiting for you just like that dog has friends waiting for him, too. I think it was cute that you immediately tried to search for a rightful owner and it got attached to you. It’s so unlike you.”

Yahaba continued watching Kyoutani who was staring intently at his shoes like a sulking child. Yahaba felt stupid for feeling frustrated earlier somehow.

Why did I have to tell a jerk like him words like that? He came in late and left by himself. He picked up an abandoned dog on his own and caused trouble for me. And now he’s sulking that the dog is gone. I’m honestly glad when he doesn’t show up to practice, yet why did I bother following him to bring him back with me…

Yahaba fell into silence as Kyoutani raised his head. And then he said, “Let‘s go. Quick.”

Then he immediately walked forward alone.

“Huh?! Oi, wait for me! I’m the one who’s supposed to be saying that!”

“You smell like dog.”

“You smell worse!!”

**********

The two walked up the school path, alternating between silence and bickering. Neither of them talked about the puppy. They probably will never talk about that dog going forward, Yahaba thought.

Soon enough, they were at school. Just as when Yahaba thought of suggesting that they explain to the senpais why they were late, he heard a feeble cry from somewhere. He looked around expecting something bad about to happen, when they noticed they were back at the empty lot where they had picked the dog up.

“Here…”

The thicket brushes against their feet. Without them realizing, they stopped and explored the area before a kitten revealed its face amid the grass.

It meowed.

“It’s a cat.”

“Hey, don’t look at it. Act like you didn’t see it!”

So said Yahaba as he pulled Kyoutani away. Yet the kitten helplessly climbed up Kyoutani’s jersey using its claws, and before he knew it the kitten was perched atop Kyoutani’s large shoulders meowing.

Then it licks Kyoutani’s cheek.

“Why the heck are they so quick to get attached to you!?”

“It’s not my fault!”

“I hate the fact that you’re so easily liked!”

“Shut the fuck up!”

It had been around an hour since practice started. The two, wearing the Aoba Jousai volleyball uniform, were still a far way off to returning to the third gym, however.

**Author's Note:**

> Again not my writing, original credit goes to Kiyoko Hoshi in the Haikyuu light novel 6.
> 
> But yeah... I love this story... I just want more people to know about it...


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